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Platypus Innovation Blog

12 April 2018

Invest in Good-Loop

This is an unusual post for me. After 10 years as an entrepreneur, I am asking for money.

Amy and I set out in 2016 with a mission: to make something positive and good in the often sordid world of online advertising. Good-Loop is an ad network, but different from any other:

50% of the money goes to charity. To be clear: that's not 50% of profits, or 50% of our commission. That's 50% of the total revenue. The rest is split, approximately 30-40% to the publisher and 10-20% to us.

The user is in control: of whether we show them an ad, and what we do with their data. This is the "ad-choice" alternative to adblockers, which avoids annoying ads whilst still supporting publishers to create.

We believe that if you treat people with respect and aim to do good, then you can create both a positive impact (money raised for charity), and a better space for advertising (happy viewers are more likely to listen than annoyed ones).

The results so far back this up: because we engage users in a positive way, Good-Loop adverts are watched rather than skipped (benchmarked against YouTube and Facebook video ads), and generate more actual customer activity (measured with one of our clients, Lifecake by Canon). Unilever's chief marketing officer, Keith Weed, describes our approach as a "win-win!" (namedropping, because, wow, not only are we working Unilever, who have one of the world's largest ad budgets and an ethical ethos, but their CMO tweeted about it).

We are not a charity: we plan to make profits and deliver a return. Our aim is to be both profitable and good for the community. I think this investment is a good bet: we have a reasonable chance of delivering an unreasonable return.

If you want to be part of what we're doing - now you can! Over April 2018, we are running an open investment round: https://seedrs.com/good-loop

This is open to anyone. The bulk of the round will likely be established investors who we've pitched to. However if you know and like what we're doing, then you can invest, regardless of cheque size -- the investments so far range from £15 to £30,000.

I hope you'll join us.
If you have any questions, feel free to contact me: daniel@sodash.com

About

The platypus caused consternation, shattered existing categories. It's existence was undeniable, but how should taxonomic theory be adapted to accommodate this uncomfortable fact? This blog is also hard to classify. It loosely follows the professional interests and activities of Daniel Winterstein. Topics are likely to range from business affairs to new media via data science and abstract mathematics.